Taiwan’s tax revenues last month posted a sharp drop, as a deadline extension for income tax filings and subdued capital market activity weighed heavily on collections, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.
Tax revenues totaled NT$313.5 billion (US$10.48 billion), down 48.6 percent from a year earlier, attributable mainly to a one-month extension in income tax filing from May 31 to June 30 to buffer against potential fallout from US tariff policy shifts, the ministry said.
Corporate income tax revenue plunged 92 percent to NT$21.7 billion, while personal income tax fell 36.3 percent to NT$42.3 billion, reflecting the deferred filing schedule, ministry statistician Liu Shun-rong (劉訓蓉) said.
Photo: CNA
The securities transaction tax revenue, a bellwether for investor sentiment, shrank 34 percent to NT$18.2 billion, marking the largest contraction in more than two years and the third consecutive month of decline, Liu said.
Average daily turnover on the Taiwan Stock Exchange stood at NT$390.7 billion last month, down 26.7 percent from a year earlier, as global macro uncertainties and US government debt concerns sidelined investors, she said.
“Although the local bourse rebounded in early May on optimism over US-China trade de-escalation and sustained artificial intelligence investment momentum, sentiment cooled later due to profit-taking and lingering tariff risks,” Liu said.
Real estate-related tax collections softened further amid weakening transactions and unfavorable lending terms, she said.
Land value increment tax revenue slumped 35.1 percent to NT$5.4 billion, the lowest in two years, while deed tax fell 29.1 percent to NT$1.3 billion, Liu said.
That came as most major municipalities, including New Taipei City, Taichung and Kaohsiung, reported double-digit retreats in property transactions last month from a year earlier, she added.
Cumulative tax revenues for the first five months of the year came in at NT$1.02 trillion, representing a 23 percent annual decline and behind the ministry’s target by 24.4 percent, Liu said.
However, things would improve this month as corporations and individuals would file their income tax from last year’s earnings, helped by TAIEX rallies, the ministry said.
When Lika Megreladze was a child, life in her native western Georgian region of Guria revolved around tea. Her mother worked for decades as a scientist at the Soviet Union’s Institute of Tea and Subtropical Crops in the village of Anaseuli, Georgia, perfecting cultivation methods for a Georgian tea industry that supplied the bulk of the vast communist state’s brews. “When I was a child, this was only my mum’s workplace. Only later I realized that it was something big,” she said. Now, the institute lies abandoned. Yellowed papers are strewn around its decaying corridors, and a statue of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin
UNIFYING OPPOSITION: Numerous companies have registered complaints over the potential levies, bringing together rival automakers in voicing their reservations US President Donald Trump is readying plans for industry-specific tariffs to kick in alongside his country-by-country duties in two weeks, ramping up his push to reshape the US’ standing in the global trading system by penalizing purchases from abroad. Administration officials could release details of Trump’s planned 50 percent duty on copper in the days before they are set to take effect on Friday next week, a person familiar with the matter said. That is the same date Trump’s “reciprocal” levies on products from more than 100 nations are slated to begin. Trump on Tuesday said that he is likely to impose tariffs
HELPING HAND: Approving the sale of H20s could give China the edge it needs to capture market share and become the global standard, a US representative said The US President Donald Trump administration’s decision allowing Nvidia Corp to resume shipments of its H20 artificial intelligence (AI) chips to China risks bolstering Beijing’s military capabilities and expanding its capacity to compete with the US, the head of the US House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party said. “The H20, which is a cost-effective and powerful AI inference chip, far surpasses China’s indigenous capability and would therefore provide a substantial increase to China’s AI development,” committee chairman John Moolenaar, a Michigan Republican, said on Friday in a letter to US Secretary of
ELECTRONICS BOOST: A predicted surge in exports would likely be driven by ICT products, exports of which have soared 84.7 percent from a year earlier, DBS said DBS Bank Ltd (星展銀行) yesterday raised its GDP growth forecast for Taiwan this year to 4 percent from 3 percent, citing robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI)-related exports and accelerated shipment activity, which are expected to offset potential headwinds from US tariffs. “Our GDP growth forecast for 2025 is revised up to 4 percent from 3 percent to reflect front-loaded exports and strong AI demand,” Singapore-based DBS senior economist Ma Tieying (馬鐵英) said in an online briefing. Taiwan’s second-quarter performance beat expectations, with GDP growth likely surpassing 5 percent, driven by a 34.1 percent year-on-year increase in exports, Ma said, citing government
RSS